One truth. Many lies.

As the world becomes bigger, our hearts become smaller. Human lives have become a pawn at a losing game. A shameful one. A heinous one. And an absolutely inexcusable one. When will it stop? It seemingly won’t. Why won’t it stop? Because every single day breeds further hate, discrimination and inequitable judgment. Innocent or guilty, the pulse of the matter is a trembling one. The race card. The royal flush of evil that’s here to stay slay.

I am enraged. Disgusted. And on the verge of losing my $hit. Because I cannot take this anymore. I cannot take the arrogance. The white supremacy. And the hate. Oh my God, the hate. My blood boils over senseless acts of discrimination. I am not white but it does not matter. Because it just doesn’t. I’m a kind human with a kind heart. And I want so badly for our world to stop these vicious fights against our own. Yes, our own. I do not care what color your skin is. We all bleed red.

It happened again. Another shooting with unspeakable terms. And a tragedy of one more {black} life lost. In my great state of Minnesota. We may be far from Louisiana but it does not make us immune to the wrongful violence of racism and police brutality. A phrase I struggle to even write. Police brutality. Because it has an umbrella tone; an assumption that all police officers are bad. Except they aren’t. I don’t believe that for a moment. I don’t want every officer to find themselves lost in that allegation. But the reality is, with each life lost like this, it becomes their struggle. And the lines get drawn. One of my best friends, the kind who’s never failed in our twenty-six years of friendship; he’s a cop. The good kind. The kind that I know exist because they signed up to honorably serve and protect. And they do it with pride. So when one of their own does a dirty, senseless deed like this, it angers them just as much as you and I. Because the good reputations get destroyed. People lose their trust in law enforcement. And that whole big world we live in? Well, it just got a lot more isolated.

I don’t know about you but this is not what I signed up for. My existence doesn’t entail this kind of fear. This kind of horror. And a lack of faith in humanity. My children don’t deserve to grow up in such a disturbing society. And neither do yours. The demanding work of our previous generations anchored a voice in civil rights. They made strides and expected their fight to be a sustained movement. But we continue to digress in all the wrong ways. SO. VERY. WRONG. And now our days are filled with headlines that make you weep and stories that make you scream. They hurt you even from afar. Because every innocent life lost is one body closer to your own.

Time to end the lies and be the truth. Show your face. And not your race.